Environment

How will Eaglecrest look 20 years from now? Will the city-owned ski area be bigger? Will there be cabins and condominiums, restaurants and bars?

Will summer cruise ship tourists put it on their agenda during their few hours in port?

A host of “what if’s” are under consideration in a long-range master plan being prepared to guide area development over the next 20 years.

Jim Calvin of Juneau’s McDowell Group is heading up the research. He says the master plan will look at the opportunities now available to Eaglecrest that would get more people enjoying the mountain.

“”It also will develop a set of criteria the board can use in 5, 10, or 15 years to evaluate proposals in light of what the community considers to be compatible uses of Eaglecrest that are consistent with how the community values Eaglecrest today,” Calvin says.

The study has been underway since August, beginning with a random telephone survey of 450 Juneau households and an assessment of the Juneau market, inclulding demographics, Calvin says.

“What are the demographics in terms of age and income? And what do other analysts and what do we see in terms of future population growth?”

In the last three years, Eaglecrest has added one new lift and replaced the platter pull with a chairlift. A gravel road winds to the top of the mountain, a major improvement for the summer hiking and biking crowd. Calvin says much of the master plan work is studying the potential summer visitor market.

“How non-residents spend their time when they’re here and how much they spend for the various excursions they enjoy while they’re in Juneau,” Calvin explains.

McDowell Group is working with the international ski area planning firm SE Group. The organization has worked with ski areas all over the country and has seen what works and doesn’t work, especially summertime development.

The Eaglecrest study team will present what they’ve learned so far at a public meeting on Wednesday, from 7 to 9:30 p.m., at Centennial Hall.

Calvin says people will want to hear SE Group’s presentation on summer and winter developments that have been successful at other ski areas. 

SE Group also is putting together displays on potential activities to expand resident and visitor use at Eaglecrest, such as new hiking and mountain biking trails.

Jan Caulfield is facilitating tomorrow’s public meeting, the first of two on the master plan.

“We’re really hoping the evening will get people thinking and coming in with written comments at a later date,” Caulfield says. “We’re asking people to submit comments by the end of November that we can work with during the planning process.”

The information gleaned so far by the study group will be presented tomorrow (Wednesday) at 7 p.m., followed by questions and the displays. Another public meeting will be held in February.

Caulfield says Juneau residents also should take an online survey asking what types of development Juneau residents would like to see at their mountain. It can be found at http://skijuneau.com.

Yesterday’s windy weather put Alaska Electric Light & Power’s system to the test.

Company spokeswoman Deb Ferreira says despite mitigation efforts, power outages are an unavoidable fact of life in Juneau.

“We did a lot of tree clearing over the summer and we have redundancy in our lines that allows us to reroute and do some switching so that we can get power restored without having to repair the damage right away. So there are things that we are doing, but Mother Nature is Mother Nature,” Ferreira says.

Approximately 8:15 last night (Tuesday), a large tree fell on two power lines and a distribution line along Channel Vista Drive, putting the entire city and borough in the dark.

Ferreira says crews cleared the tree and power was restored in stages, with all parts of the borough back on by 9:35 p.m. The tree did not damage any equipment.

The area wide outage followed isolated blackouts throughout town during the day. Parts of downtown and all of Douglas were without power for less than an hour yesterday afternoon, after a tree fell on a power line out Thane Road.

Ferreira says the utility temporarily rerouted power from other parts of the system, while a crew repaired the damaged line. That outage occurred at about 12:15, and power was restored by 1 p.m. About 3,600 customers were affected.

A short time later at about 1:40 a second outage affected parts of downtown again, as well as Salmon Creek and Lemon Creek. Ferreira says it was caused by a tree branch that hit a power line. Crews were able to restore power from that outage just after 2 p.m. It affected about 1,400 customers.

Yesterday’s peak wind gust at the Juneau Airport was clocked at 53 miles per hour. There were also sustained winds of 20 to 30 miles per hour throughout the day.

Alaska State Troopers have released the name of the helicopter pilot killed in a crash outside Iliamna in southwest Alaska.

Troopers say 66-year-old William Zeman of Douglas was a senior pilot for Era Helicopters. He was killed in the crash Saturday near the village on Iliamna Lake.

The helicopter had been used for seismic work in Nome.

National Transportation Safety Board investigator Clint Johnson said the helicopter was headed to Anchorage.

Zeman had made refueling stops in Unalakleet and Bethel and planned to spend the night in Iliamna.

Era’s GPS and web-based tracking system received a final signal from the helicopter at 8:02 p.m. Saturday.

Helicopter wreckage, with Zeman’s body inside, was discovered by searchers at about noon Sunday six miles southwest of Iliamna.

Eaglecrest wants to hear from you.

The city-owned ski and snowboard area is conducting a survey to gauge community interest in future development. The survey is part of a long-range master plan being prepared to guide the course of the area over the next 20 years.

The online survey can be found at skijuneau.com. Topics include a range of development from controversial motorized use of the mountain to hiking and biking trails, lodge expansion, alcohol sales, even building condos and cabins.

A public meeting on the master plan is scheduled for Wednesday, from 7 to 9:30 p.m., at Centennial Hall.

A Juneau man is dead after a diving accident Monday morning in Funter Bay on the west side of Admiralty Island.

Alaska State Troopers say 35-year-old John Robert Pugh, Jr. didn’t come up from his second dive of the day, sometime before 8 o’ clock Monday morning. An unidentified companion went in after him, administered CPR, and brought Pugh to the Auke Bay boat launch aboard a 21-foot skiff.

Pugh is the son of University of Alaska Southeast Chancellor John Pugh and former Alaska Corrections Commissioner Margaret Pugh. State business records list him as holder of a business license for the Scuba Tank dive shop on Dunn Street and a part owner of the company Johnny’s Oysters for which the business license expired in 2007.

Pugh was reportedly diving in about 20- to 25-feet of water when the accident occurred. He was reportedly found near the bottom with the regulator out of his mouth.

Sergent Tim Birt says troopers have requested an autopsy by the state Medical Examiner’s office in Anchorage, because the death happened in a remote area and was unobserved. An investigation is underway, but the death is not considered suspicious.

Birt says the commercial sea cucumber dive fishery was getting underway in the area Monday, but he says Pugh’s dive was considered recreational in nature.

The Alaska Department of Fish and Game is warning local waterfowl hunters to be safe after a report of someone firing shots toward the runway at the Juneau Airport.

Area Management Biologist Ryan Scott says the hunters were allegedly not on the nearby Mendenhall Wetlands State Game Refuge.

“A couple things there,” says Scott. “One, it’s obviously not very safe to be shooting that direction. Two, during the waterfowl season, waterfowl hunters can use a shotgun to hunt ducks and geese on the refuge, but you’ve got to be on the refuge.”

Scott says the incident is under investigation. He’s not aware of any pending charges at this point.

The waterfowl hunting season stretches from mid-September to the end of the year. Since 2003, Scott says the department has required a permit to hunt on the Mendenhall refuge.

“The purpose of that permit was so that we could have some time with the hunter, explain some of the issues and concerns out there, and then provide them with the information to make sure folks make good decisions out there,” Scott says. “I would say 99.9 percent of the waterfowl hunters utilizing the refuge use very good, safe hunting practices. But it could just take a couple things and it could really reflect negatively on everybody.”

Scott says about 300 people apply for permits every year, making it one of the most popular hunts in Juneau.